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Best Travel Debit and Credit Cards USA: Are You Focusing On The Wrong Thing?

Travel Tips

15/06/2019

When shopping around for a travel credit or debit card, so many people focus on irrelevant or the wrong things. Or get swayed by sexy marketing. Not actually sexy, it’s still banking, but you know what I mean. But what should you be focusing on? That’s what we will talk about today. If you are from the USA, you’ll be able to access awesome travel debit and credit cards. I’m not a US resident so I’m not best placed to help you too much here. Do Google a few other blogs.

But before you shoot off and leave us. Here are a few things you should think about and focus on BEFORE you get a travel credit or debit card, so you don’t end up with a crap travel bank card that doesn’t suit your needs.

US Travel Debit Cards

International bank fees absolutely suck when travelling.

My bank changed my terms and conditions on one trip, so I couldn’t avoid bank fees when using my card whilst travelling. I ended up paying almost $800 in bank fees over 6 months. Banks can charge you 7 different bank fees when you use your card abroad, and you don’t have to pay these fees!

Don’t Waste Money: Get A Fee Free Debit Card

Don’t waste a load of money like I did, look for debit cards that give you fee free foreign purchases and ATM withdrawals.

You Can Get ATM fees REFUNDED!!

In the USA, you can even get cards that actually refund you local ATM fees you get stuck paying. So you can use any ATM you want and not worry about that $7 ATM fee in Thailand or that $10 ATM fee in Argentina. Hey, can we get some more of those types of cards in the UK?

The cards tend to have limits and / or fees. Or you need to hold a minimum balance, or open a linked account, so as always, make sure you fully read the terms and conditions.

A Good Travel Debit Card Option

The Schwab High Yield Investor Checking Account with the Platinum debit card could be the current best travel debit card option. You get ATM fee rebates, there are no monthly fees or minimum balance requirements and there are no fees on foreign purchases apart from the standard Visa mark-up (which you can’t really avoid).

US Travel Credit Cards

When it comes to the best US travel credit cards there are normally 2 main things to consider.

Whether you get fee free foreign purchases

What rewards schemes the cards give you

Fee Free First, Rewards Second

In my view getting fee free foreign purchases is the most important thing when looking at travel credit cards.

So I think you are better off searching for all the credit cards that will give you fee free foreign purchases and have no monthly costs, then picking the ones that give you the best rewards schemes.

It is worth noting that withdrawing cash anywhere on US credit cards will usually incur a hefty fee, so try and avoid this.

Rewards, Rewards, Rewards

Picking the best credit card rewards scheme is entirely based on your personal situation. Do you want cashback, airmiles, free nights in hotels or lounge access? Do you use certain hotel or airline brands loads? This will all play a part in your decision.

Gives some decent rewards like an intro bonus of 20,000 airmiles, 10x airmiles on lots of hotels, 1.25x airmiles on all purchases and the airmiles won’t expire

Focus On Fees

To recap, when looking at your next travel debit and credit cards in the USA (or anywhere), focus on bank fees.Or in fact, a lack of them. Not getting a fee free card could cost you shed loads, and you could spend this money on MORE travel. Which is what we all want really isn’t it?

BORING DISCLAIMER:

This post is up to date as of March 2019 and will be updated periodically. Always check with the companies mentioned below and keep an eye out for new ones I haven’t mentioned. I’ve mostly focused on the UK context. Feel free to get in touch with me if you have any tips from your country you would like me to include.

This is what I’ve found to be suitable for our needs. Yours may differ and so the Ultimate Travel Money Blogs can only be taken as a guide rather than constitute personalised financial advice. Please get in touch if you have any specific questions and I will do my best to answer them.